Belleayre Gondola Discussion Thread

I commented on the post they made on fb saying I was disappointed with the lack of an announcement, and they PM'd me saying they'll tell me why it happened this way if I came to the management office.  So I'll find out tomorrow but if it's so secret that they can't just send me it in the message I probably can't post it here.

Apparently it passed load test last night so clearly they had some idea that it would open today but chose not to say anything.  But without inside knowledge I couldn't predict anything.  I had yet to see any ski area open a lift like this without giving at least a little notice.

The other ski areas with new lifts announced their openings 1-2 days prior.  This is what Sunday River, Sugarbush, and Mount Peter did.  Only Song Mountain has a new lift that's not open yet and we'll see what they do.

And to think I was always on the edge of my seat waiting for the new Hendrix album.

Who knows. Maybe Doppolymer was giving them inconsistent answers, answers that that might make them cautious to announce something on such late notice and then they suffer a set back and they have a load of pissed off customers who came just for that reason. Given the time frame of this Holiday week Im sure they wanted to get it running asap, grand ceremony or not.

Life goes on, the Gondola is officially running at Belleayre.... who would have ever thought of such a thing.

I found out for sure why they didn't announce the opening beforehand, but I get the sense that they don't want me to post why on the internet so PM me if you want to know.

I rode the gondola today and skied the new trail.

How was the new trail sno? How about the pitch right after the bridge? Did it turn out steeper then the rest of the trail? Nice pics by the way

The trail is consistent blue pitch from where it begins near Tomahawk until just after the pitch on the bottom side of the bridge.  It's a runout below there but is not quite as flat as the rest of the lower mountain and you can make it through the whole thing without skating.

They did seem to fill it in with snowmaking a bit just after the bridge which made the pitch a bit less steep but longer.

The gondola is the smoothest quietest lift I've ever ridden and you can barely even feel it when going over the towers.  It's bottom drive but you can't even hear it when standing as far away as the lodge.  Doppelmayr uses some sound insulation on their terminals and they are designed to have minimal vibrations.

The platforms are designed to be radiant heated to prevent ice from building up, but obviously it isn't working yet.  They need to get the boiler units on site and it may not happen till next year.  Unfortunately the top platform was very slippery.  They could salt them, but that's disgusting and it would get all over the cabins.  So be careful when getting out at the top.

Nice photos.

What did you think of the trail and the bridge?

(Ha Brownski, same question.)

I already answered that when responding to Brownski.

I noticed another added benefit of the gondola is it makes it much more enjoyable to work as an instructor at Belleayre.  All teaching activity is based out of the Discovery Lodge.  Before, when instructors either didn't get assigned a lesson or were on their breaks, they could only ski the lower mountain because it took 10-12 minutes to ride the double double and you still had to ride Superchief to get to the top.  With the gondola they can get directly to the upper mountain to ski when not teaching and right back down to the lower for the next lesson.

The gondola also takes so much pressure off the Superchief during the morning rush and after lunch rush.  Everyone going from the Discovery Lodge to the upper mountain had to ride it.  And everyone who started at Overlook who didn't want to walk up to 7 had to ride it.  Since anyone starting at either lodge had to ride it, there was a major bottleneck.  Now, anyone going to the upper mountain from the Discovery Lodge can use the gondola so the Superchief only needs to handle those coming from Overlook.

Did you christen it with a phat bowl?

Benny Profane wrote

Did you christen it with a phat bowl?

I laughed out loud. I doubt sno did but you reminded me of the first time I brought junior on the skyeship at killington. We got on at the base with a couple strangers and as soon as the doors closed you could tell it's previous occupants were smoking up, really strong nasty stuff. Junior piped right up and said "jeez, I wonder how a skunk got in here?" Everybody laughed. I figured his ignorance was evidence of good parenting.

snoloco wrote

I already answered that when responding to Brownski.

Doh! Not paying attention on a bleary-eyed ride home, apparently.

It seemed like a lot to fill in with snowmaking to me.  Also while it does faces north (?) I wonder how it will hold up in spring.  My guess is that they will address it next summer.

Would love to see a photo of that spot.

Last week a buddy and I rode up with three young dirtbags making a cloud after they asked if it was cool. It was so bad I was coughing from the second hand. I tired to warn these kids about search dogs for their drive home, but, I think they'll learn the hard way someday.

I agree with an above post, that gondola isn't a ski lift, it's a central component of that resort fantasy that some state administrator planned into his Disney fantasy in the Catskills. Ten to one that decision to squander tax dollars was made by people who really don't ski. Is there a casino being built? Lord, that's what that place needs. A full blown casino. Then I'll never go back. Nothing like walking into a lodge filled wth alcoholic smokers gambling their meager earnings away to make one look at the bright side of life after a ski day.

So glad to go to Gore the next day. How could management be so different within the same stare agency?

Rode the gondola the last couple days and I'm impressed. I took a wait and see attitude with the whole thing and it's better than I thought it would be. Deer run to lower deer run is a really long run and will be excellent for intermediate skiers. The gondola itself is very smooth and fast. The gondola line was great skiing on Saturday even though it's closed and they're not going to make it into a trail it's going to be hard to keep people out of there.

Harvey, the bridge is a little steeper than the rest of the trail on the back side but they filled it in some already with snow and they're going to make more snow in that area as well. I imagine they'll bring more fill in this summer.

The added lift capacity will mean there will be no lines at any of the chairs anymore. Lift 6 was virtually empty right from the minute the gondola opened Saturday morning. It wasn't a particularly crowded day anyway but I expect to be able to ski the nice east side bump and tree terrain from the high speed even on busy days with zero wait.

The reason they didn't announce the gondola in advance was two fold. First was it didn't finish with its load testing and approval until 9:30 Friday night before a Saturday morning opening. Second is the Governor's office asked them not to announce it until the Governor put out a press release.

Benny Profane you are wrong about this not being designed by skiers.

This really opens the door for highmount expansion. While it would take away some currently reserved terrain for us, it will be awesome!

Harvey wrote

snoloco wrote

I already answered that when responding to Brownski.

Doh! Not paying attention on a bleary-eyed ride home, apparently.

It seemed like a lot to fill in with snowmaking to me.  Also while it does faces north (?) I wonder how it will hold up in spring.  My guess is that they will address it next summer.

Would love to see a photo of that spot.

I'm going tomorrow so I will be able to get more detailed pics of the trail.  I was more focused on pictures of the gondola itself on Sunday.

I don't think it will matter much in the spring since they often close the lower mountain before the last weekend.  Not many people learning to ski in April.

They filled most of it in with fill, and did the rest with snowmaking.  They brought in a fan gun to lay down a lot of snow really fast.

Appears that with the addition of the gondola, they no longer operate the Tomahawk Quad midweek.  Although in these temps no one would ride it with a gondola going to the same place.

Hopefully they revise their Highmount/Belleayre West plans and realign the proposed Belleayre West lift to end where the Tomahawk currently does, they could sell the Tomahawk and have a much more useful Belleayre West lift, serving far more terrain than currently proposed.

Not a good idea.  The top of Deer Run is incredibly flat.  Just have the Tomahawk run only on weekends and Belleayre west and gondola can run daily.

It's not that bad, atleast the Belleayre West lift to that point would give you access to Dot Nebel, Seneca, and most of the mid-West trails in the middle all funneling back to it's starting point by the access road intersection. Currently proposed, the Belleayre West lift would functionally exist to serve two new trails which seems like a huge amount of capital investment for minimal access.

I mean the Gondola's unloading area location is even worse in that regards, and no worse than it is from the Tomahawk as it is currently, right?

Edit: Even better, with the increased lift line length and traffic maybe they could make it a HSQuad instead of the proposed Fixed Grip Triple.... thats a solid win for you

I think the plan is fine the way it is.  Tomahawk is the best sited lift for lapping the West Side terrain and removing it would ruin that side since no matter what every trail would funnel down to a single runout.  It's fine running just the gondola midweek since hardly anyone is on the mountain and the bridge trail doesn't get too crowded.  But it would be a disaster on weekends.